On 2001-11-15 at 22:07 -0500, Derek Broughton wrote:
> On November 15, 2001 09:43 pm, Phil Pennock wrote:
> > Another fix would be to simply expand your current /etc/hosts
> > slightly: 127.0.0.1 mercury localhost localhost.MYEMPLOYER.com
> >
> Isn't that backwards? D***ed if I can find the documentation now,
> but isn't the second address supposed to be canonical? I've never
> been certain it really mattered, but I'm pretty sure that's the way
> it's defined.
The documentation should be hosts(5).
In order:
Internet address
Official host name
Aliases
I might be wrong, but I tend to view the official name of 127.0.0.1 as
'localhost', and any other names as convenient aliases to work around
things which try to tack a domain on.
The only place that I _think_ that it makes a difference is in tools
which look up the IP address to get the hostname, eg netstat(1),
route(8) and friends, and display the first result.
For that reason, I'd put "localhost" before the "mercury". But I'd
still put "localhost" first so that it looks prettier, instead of having
truncated bogus domain info showing. :^)
Unless it's a factual correction, replies should probably be off-list as
this has drifted from Exim just a wee tad. Mea culpa.
--
People do not like to think. If one thinks, one must reach conclusions.
Conclusions are not always pleasant. -- Helen Keller
